


i lived in this house with you

by welivewithghosts



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe, Beach House, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Sad, Suicide, czernsey, i think thats the most clever ship name ever, im sorry this is so short, really sad, there isn't a happy ending???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-20
Updated: 2017-01-20
Packaged: 2018-09-18 20:22:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9401450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/welivewithghosts/pseuds/welivewithghosts
Summary: noah lived in this house with him, the brass doorknobs, the carpet stairs, the sound of rain.





	

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this as a free write in my creative writing class and really liked it, so here it is fine tuned a bit.
> 
> the title is borrowed from a line in a book by jamaica kincaid.

noah lived in this house with him, the brass doorknobs, the wood shingles. the carpet stairs, the driftwood boxes, the sound of rain.

he remembers how they only ever used one room. left the other two empty. they had piles of books they never shelved and jars gansey painted blue. they had an ocean out the back window, wheat gold and country road out the front. they were the only people along that road for miles, just them and the wide, wide open.

in summer the sand was soft and hot. noah picked the beach grasses and put them in empty wine bottles along the windowsills, gansey took pictures of the seagulls. they listened to chet baker all july.

in winter the snow fell so heavy it swallowed all the sound. at night they used to stand in the backyard in nothing but pyjamas, knee deep in snow so bright it reflected the moon. they had fires in the living room and fell asleep to the stories of the flames.

noah lived in this house with him and some years it did nothing but rain. some years the wind had teeth. gansey lived with his silence for so long it became a part of him. some years he barely talked at all.

he remembers that time in april. he asked gansey when they were leaving. he remembers how sad gansey’s eyes got.

how gansey said, “not yet. i like the feel of the ocean in my bones.”

how noah didn’t ask again.

they spent countless days in bed, hand rolled joints and walt whitman, trading smoke between mouths and recitations. “o’ captain, my captain,” noah told him, pressed it into gansey's lips like dried flower petals. “rise up and hear the bells.”

“robin williams does it better,” gansey said and laughed and touched noah’s hair. noah used to think laughing meant happiness, but a couple months later he found gansey making razor cuts on his thighs on the shower floor. gansey laughed that time too.

noah used to kiss gansey’s morning mouth, his tired skin painted bronze, paper sunbeams in his hair. gansey’s body was soft against the sheets, noah made tea just to lick the honey from his tongue. the sunlight used to feel like healing.

today, noah steps through the door and it’s dark. it’s the second tuesday of september. they used to always have the lights on and the curtains open. gansey told him that only bad things happen in the dark and they do, they do, they do.

it’s been five years to the day since noah’s been back here. five years and the rooms are empty. dust has settled over everything. nobody’s been inside since they left. _too far from the city,_ the property manager had said, _nobody wants a place like this anymore._

but gansey did.

noah thinks about the night the ocean took his boy, how his voice and the storm blended together in their bed, how he didn’t hear the last thing gansey said to him.

maybe it was _i love you._

maybe it was _darling, forgive me._

gansey was naked when he walked into the water. noah found his clothes on the beach the next morning. three days later they found his body.

it was the second tuesday of september. the leaves were still green.

noah remembers the helicopters circling the beach, sleeping on the couch with the tv on because this time the silence was too much. when they showed him gansey’s body it was colder than ice. his lips were blue, but noah kissed them anyways. 

he remembers standing at the back window, how the police officer stood there next to him and he couldn’t look at her. he remembers her telling him she needed to ask him a few questions.

_was he sad?_

_yes, but so was i._

_do you know why he killed himself?_

_maybe he loved the ocean so much he wanted to become it._

today, it’s been five years and noah concentrates on breathing. he touches the walls, the rusting doorknobs. he stands by the window and counts the birds.


End file.
